One of the best ways to discover God's faithfulness is to write our prayers. I discovered this years ago. One afternoon I wanted to pray but was sleepy. Simply to stay awake, I began writing my prayer in my notebook. Many days later I found that prayer, and tears came to my eyes as I read. God had answered those prayers in the exact way I had requested. I never would have realized it if I had not recorded my requests.

In Ken Bible's excellent book His Personal Presence, he relates that a few years ago he began writing his prayers. One day he read back through those prayers. To his amazement, he saw a recurring pattern: he would pray about a need, often in desperation, and a short time later that need was provided. "But by the time the answer came," he said, "I was already concentrating on another concern. Thus I sometimes didn't recognize the answer when it came. And I completely missed the pattern-until I looked back." He rediscovered what he had learned as a child: God answers prayer.

One lady said that in her first 227 days of writing her prayers, she had recorded 130 requests. She later found that God had answered 127 of them. If she had prayed those same prayers without recording them, it's unlikely she would have noted God's faithful responses to her praying.